


gravity.

by Hydro1913



Category: Marianas Trench (Band)
Genre: F/M, I LOVE THAT JOSH AND AMANDA GOT MARRIED BUT THERES SO MUCH JOSH AND MATT CHEMISTRY PLEASE NO HATE, Infidelity, M/M, Multi, One-Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-24
Updated: 2020-03-24
Packaged: 2021-03-01 04:08:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23299078
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hydro1913/pseuds/Hydro1913
Summary: Something always brings me back to you.It never takes too long.
Relationships: Amanda McEwan/Josh Ramsay, Matt Webb/Josh Ramsay
Comments: 2
Kudos: 3





	gravity.

**Author's Note:**

> Alright so IM SO GLAD JOSH AND AMANDA GOT MARRIED I THOUGHT IT WAS OVER BUT THEY GOT A SECOND CHANCE SO NDNSAAABFJAJFW
> 
> But yeah heres a Jatt fic that i wrote after listening to a good song, “Gravity” by Sara Bareilles
> 
> Maybe you could even listen to it reading this ;)

_gravity._

  
Something _ always brings me back to you. _

Josh watches as the man brushes away a hair from his fiancée’s face.

_ It never takes too long. _

She smiles at him. A real smile. Not like the ones she forces, tight lips, lip gloss. Never a crinkle in her eyes like she does right now.

_ No matter what I say or do... _

Josh stands up from where he sits from a chair that dozens of people probably sat on, picks up his phone from where a dozen people put their food and a dozen pigeons perched on. His chair screeches backwards on the pavement, like how it does every time for dozens of people in a hurry.

_ I still feel you here, ‘til the moment I’m gone... _

——————————————————————

_ You hold me without touch... _

She’s asleep. He’s wide awake. Reaches out to touch her face. Just a whisper on her face. She shifts, murmurs a name that isn’t his.

_ You keep me without chains... _

He wonders how many nights she spent without him. Wonders if that man would touch her just like this. Wonders if she would hold him back. She’s not holding Josh.

_ I never wanted anything so much... _

He gets up. Finds his crinkled shirt on the floor and puts it on. Fidgets with his ring as he looks at Amanda. Looks outside. Looks at her again.

_ Than to drown in your love, and not feel your reign... _

The door closes behind him.

——————————————————————

_ Set me free. _

Their picture seemed to have toppled. Maybe from Josh bumping into it by accident trying to get to work, or something else. He looks at it for a moment, before he stands it back up again. He remembers seeing no ring on Amanda’s finger today.

_ Leave me be. _

He opens the curtains. Sees the cars passing by. A bus. Briefly ponders making a cup of coffee.

_ I don’t wanna fall another moment into your gravity. _

He looks around at the house. Takes a deep breath. He foregoes the coffee, grabs his jacket and shoes, turns the doorknob and feels the breeze hit his face.

_ Here I am, and I stand so tall... _

The bus stop bench is creaky. Josh sits down anyway. Finds his phone in his pocket. It’s at forty-two percent.

_ Just the way I’m supposed to be.  _

The bus comes two minutes after its scheduled time. Josh finds a seat near the window, watches the houses, mailboxes, cars and power lines pass by, silent, the only sound coming from the air conditioner. 

_ But you’re onto me. _

He opens his phone again, and looks at her smile. Looks at his. Looks at the rings on their hands.

_ And all over me. _

He shuts his phone off.

——————————————————————

_ You loved me ‘cause I’m fragile. _

He steps off the bus when he sees the ocean, the salty air hitting his nose and he knows sand gets into his air. He walks along the fence right before the beach, watching the seagulls as they run on the sand.

_ When I thought that I was strong. _

He wonders if Amanda knows he knows. He wonders if he even cares. He wonders if he wasn’t good enough. He wonders when he’ll go back. If he wants to go back.

_ But you touch me for a little while. _

Maybe he’ll take off his shoes and run into the water, jeans and all.

_ And all my fragile strength is gone. _

——————————————————————

“Hey.”

There’s a tap on his shoulder and he jolts. He whirls around to see Matt, who gives him a startled look that probably rivals his own.

“Hey?”

“Oh. Hey.” Josh lets out a sigh. “Hi.”

Matt gives him a look that Josh knows from experience is a concerned one, before he sidles up to the fence next to him and looks out at the ocean. Josh watches as the sea breeze blows Matt’s hair every which way.

“It’s beautiful,” Matt says, and Josh takes two seconds to look back to the ocean. He watched as the waves crash against the shore, glittering from the the sun shining overhead. He breathes in, and his head is clear. Or maybe it’s fuzzy.

“Yeah,” he goes. “Yeah, it is.”

There’s a silence then. Matt adjusts himself so that his forearms are on the railing and continues staring out, and Josh fidgets with his pockets. He finds a hole in the right one. He has a feeling that Matt’s waiting for him to say something, but as seagulls call to each other from overhead and kids are laughing as they chase each other across the beach, maybe he doesn’t need to say anything at all.

The silence slowly becomes gentle, a small cloud around his shoulders, maybe around Matt’s too. His fingers stop scratching the insides of his jacket. 

It’s familiar, Josh realizes. Matt and him have known each other for so long that it’s easy to fall into this. For years they’ve shared this silence with each other. 

And Josh also knows, not just thinks, that he hasn’t been with Matt as much as he used to. Something like a rock settles into his stomach, cold and damp.

Matt doesn’t let him brood on it for long, because he turns then to look at him. Josh looks back at him almost instinctively, watches as Matt’s hair goes into his eyes from the wind.

“Wanna go somewhere?” he asks, and his lips turn up a little at the corners.

Anywhere, Josh wants to say.

——————————————————————

They end up at their studio. Matt had driven as fast as legally possible, and Josh had either looked outside or at him.

Matt picks up his guitar, quickly tuning it before setting it on his hip. He glances at Josh again, another upturn of the lips, and Josh isn’t sure what he’s feeling. “What song?”

Josh chooses “Iris”, and Matt’s smile becomes a lot more gentle, his eyes softer, and he starts to strum.

As he plays, Josh is transported back into time, to a younger Matt, a younger him, jamming to a younger radio, to a younger band called The Goo Goo Dolls, and he closes his eyes.

——————————————————————

Matt asks him if he wants to get anything to eat. He shakes his head, and says for the first time since this afternoon that he needs to go home, and automatically regrets it. He’d rather just hang out with Matt.

It probably shows on his face, because Matt’s eyes change color, shifting to a darker, worried brown. Josh has seen that look before.

He’s seen that look lots of times.

“I’m here if you ever want to talk,” Matt says, and it sounds quiet and stiff yet Josh knows he means it, and it feels that Matt is trying to hold himself back, but fails, and he gives Josh an awkward one armed hug. 

“Yeah?” he repeats, falling back and Josh can only nod.

“Sure.”

——————————————————————

Josh decides to buy shit so his stay outside wouldn’t be for nothing, or so he tells himself. 

He comes home with two bags of stuff he thinks they might need, and can see Amanda in the kitchen, on the phone, talking work.

Josh recognizes the voice on the phone, but doesn’t say anything as he kisses her on the cheek, ignores her forced smile as he begins to put the things into the fridge.

——————————————————————

They don’t really talk. He does his band stuff and she does her model stuff and it feels like they’re sharing the same house and rings that don’t mean anything. 

Josh wonders if they should even get married.

He tries to find one thing that means something to him, yet everything goes back to Matt.

Matt.

For just a few hours today, it’s like everything was clear, and bright, easy, Josh and Matt in their own world.

People might say that kind of friendship takes a whole new level. Josh might agree with that.

Josh and Matt were different from every other friendship. Even Amanda said that.

Even Amanda...

He turns his bedside lamp off, and tries to ignore that Amanda smiles every time she gets a message from that man, as he closes his eyes.

——————————————————————

Josh wakes up, and Amanda’s side is cold. He remembers faintly she had a photoshoot. Sits up in bed, digs around for his phone on the bedside table.

There’s two messages from Matt.

They’re of two memes Josh smiles at, before he types back, adding a question.

Matt’s reply is a thumbs up.

——————————————————————

“So. Biking.”

Josh doesn’t know how else to put it, so he shrugs and nods. 

Matt doesn’t seem too bothered, an amused smirk on his lips as he wheels his bike to the beginning of the road. “Remember the last time we were here?”

Josh smiles at the famous memory of their friend Chris’s Power Ranger boxers as his legs hang out of a Stanley Park trash can.

“Who could forget?”

They both laugh, and Josh realizes how much Matt’s eyes twinkle even though he’s always known that, and the guitarist winks at him before throwing a leg over his bike and starting down the road. “Race ya!”

“Bitch-“ Josh struggles onto his own bike, his seat not quite adjusted.

Matt’s laugh could be heard for miles.

——————————————————————

Matt asks him again for dinner, and Josh, thinking of the obvious and stilted conversation between him and Amanda, agrees to it this time, and watches as Matt’s eyes light up.

It becomes a competition on who could eat their salad the fastest, which Josh wins by like half a heartbeat, and he feels woozy but Matt’s laughing and the waiters are staring at them but he couldn’t care less.

It’s been fifteen minutes since Josh and Matt had crowded into the bathroom, and since they have been sharing the small cake that was for dessert, the sound of clinking from other plates in the room filling the comfortable silence.

It’s broken when Matt asks, “Do you want to get married?”

Josh stops struggling to get the piece of chocolate cake onto his fork, and sets the utensil down quietly.

He looks up at Matt, who has an ashen look to his expression, concern and worry all there, a mishmash.

“I don’t know.”

——————————————————————

Amanda doesn’t come home that night.

Josh opens his balcony door and steps outside. He breathes in the air, sees the city lights twinkle, feels the wind sweep at his hair. He leans his forearms on the railing.

It’s beautiful, he mouths to himself.

Yeah, a voice in his head says back.

Yeah, it is.

——————————————————————

Two weeks pass. Josh knows what this is.

He knows why he barely comes home anymore.

He knows why conversation between him and Amanda is so stilted.

He knows why he’s always spending time with Matt these days.

But he doesn’t know what to do. 

There’s no way to fix this.

——————————————————————

Two days since the day he realized. It’s somewhere between noon and one that he and Amanda fight. 

It ends with him outside sitting on the front steps, his head in his hands. She’s somewhere upstairs with the door locked.

His head hurts, his heart aches. Any direction he goes would end in disaster. He’s fucking trapped and he can’t get out.

He thinks of her smile. His smile. Her laugh. His laugh.

Perfume. The smell of pancakes.

Fuck.

It’s somewhere around four when he hears the sound of wheels against old pavement, and he picks his head up to see the car window roll down to reveal Matt, who doesn’t say anything, gives him a meaningful stare.

_ Set me free, leave me be... _

Josh nearly signals Matt to leave. He doesn’t know what he’s feeling. Everything should be telling him no. They don’t tell him that.

_ I don’t wanna fall another moment into your gravity. _

He gets up anyway. Keeps his eyes on the pavement as he walks over. Opens the door and slides in. He wonders if Amanda sees him right now. If Matt cared if she did.

_ Here I am, and I stand so tall... _

Matt pulls out of the driveway swiftly. Josh watches as his house fades away the rearview mirror.

_ Just the way I’m supposed to be. _

He gives Matt a sideways glance. 

_ But you’re onto me. _

Matt’s eyes were on the road, but at Josh’s look, his lips twist up into a familiar smile.

_ And all over me. _

——————————————————————

Matt stops at a meadow.

Josh looks outside at the windblown grass and remember a younger him and Matt. Chris and Andrew.

Matt sits where he always does, before he lies back and stares at the sky.

Josh watches him for a few moments, before joining him. The sky’s pink. Gold. Orange. Purple. 

It’s silent for a moment. Josh doesn’t know how long it is before any of them speak, but he knows it’s after he goes through a dozen memories of everyone in this exact spot. Booze. Laughter. Looking at the sky.

He talks first. He feels a million years older. “Remember when Andrew told us his brother had cancer?”

The wind picks up. Josh watches as Matt’s hair blows out of his face. There’s a sad, wistful smile there. “Yeah. We cried a lot.”

“We should visit him sometime. See him and his kids. And the cemetery.”

“Yeah, we could do that.”

They talk about their escapades. About Josh’s mom’s food. Chris’s house. Ramsay Fiction. Rehab. Memorable performances. Scrapbooks. Songs Matt’s working on. Songs Josh’s working on. Things they didn’t know. Things they did know. Things they forgot. 

“That sounds really good,” Matt comments after Josh explains some lyrics he came up with. “You got a name for the album?”

“Nah, any ideas?”

“Call it Astoria.”

“Okay.”

It’s silence for another few moments. Josh watches as the sun sets beyond the horizon. Can feel, rather than see, the stars twinkling into existence.

“What are you going to do?” Matt asks. The grass rustles around them.

Josh feels a lump in his throat as he sits up to turn and look at Matt. He feels his mouth open. His lips don’t move.

Matt mirrors him. His eyebrows are furrowed. Josh’s chest twists.

“I...Is there anything I could do?”

Matt’s eyes seem to glimmer. Josh wonders if it’s the wind. Or something deeper than that.

“You could talk. To her.”

Talk to Amanda. Josh resists the urge to rub his eyes out with his fists. “How could I just talk to her about this?” 

He wants to yell. Shake Matt by the shoulders. Bring him closer. 

“Four years, Matt. Four! I can’t just talk to her about this. She’s gonna think it was the pressure. I can’t do that to her.”

Matt’s eyes narrow, and he scoots closer. Josh feels like a fucking storm. “Does she seem happy?”

“I...” Josh’s protest dies in his throat. He thinks of the fake smiles. Lip gloss. The man whispering into her shoulder and she’s smiling. For real. “No.”

Matt’s eyes glint as if to say, there’s your answer.

Josh leans in. His head’s saying a shit ton, but he just wants to be closer. Feels Matt’s breath in his face. He presses in, more, Matt seems to be doing the same-

There’s a weight on Josh’s chest. Matt’s hands. They force him away. They seem to linger, but Matt’s scooting away from Josh. 

“No,” Matt says. His voice sounds choked up. “Not like this.”

Josh sees a tear in his eye before Matt wipes it away. 

“Why?” he asks.

Matt looks up at him. Josh sees a wet streak on his face.

“You’d regret it for the rest of your life.”

——————————————————————

It’s when Matt drops him back off at his house that Josh realizes he was right. 

He would have regretted it. He wouldn’t have done any better than what Amanda did.

Opens the door with his key, steps in, and sees her sitting at the table.

She looks up at him, before she taps something on her phone, then sets it down.

Joshua beats her to it. “We should talk.” 

Her lips close. She nods.

——————————————————————

He tells her about everything. How he’s been feeling. The emptiness. The distance. About the man and her.

_ I leave here on my knees as I try to make you see that you’re... _

He’s right, he knows, when her eyes dart away from his. 

_ Everything I think I need here on the ground... _

She tells him everything. How long she’s been seeing this man. How long she’s been feeling the same way. Josh takes a deep breath, and tells her about Matt.

_ But you’re neither friend nor foe... _

She smiles, as if she knew. She probably did.

_ Though I can’t seem to let you go... _

Josh doesn’t know who starts crying first. Maybe it was him. He hugs her though, tight.

She asks him if they should sleep in the same house tonight. 

“Be with who you want to be,” he tells her, instead.

She tells him she’ll be back in the next few days.

_ The one thing that I still know is that you’re keeping me down... _

She’s gone.

_ You’re keeping me down... _

It’s over.

——————————————————————

A half an hour after she leaves, Josh picks his head up from his crossed arms. He sees Amanda’s ring across the table. It glints under the light.

He takes off his ring too. Leaves it at the table.

He goes to the window. Opens the curtains. 

Taps the green button on his phone and presses it to his ear.

——————————————————————

Josh opens the door to the night air, and sees Matt, hands at his sides. They seem to shake a little.

“Hey,” he says quietly, and Josh can feel the tears sting at his eyes again, and he’s about to close them to force them back, but Matt’s already surging over the doorstep to pull him into his arms.

Josh cries into his shoulder for a really long time. Matt holds him, hand on his head, for a really long time.

The crickets chirp.

_ You’re onto me, onto me, and all over... _

——————————————————————

Josh wakes the next morning to the sounds of the balcony door open.

The tinny of a voice over the phone. Matt’s low timbre.

Josh looks at the handle of the closet door as he hears an older Andrew, an Andrew he hasn’t heard in a long time. “We could see you later today.”

“Yeah?” Josh can hear Matt’s smile. “That’s good. Two sound good?”

“You betcha.”

“Alright, we’ll see you then!”

Matt hangs up then, and Josh can hear the rumble of the cars below.

Josh gets up then, can see Matt as he turns to look at him too. 

The air’s crisp as he steps outside.

“Andrew’s?”

“Yeah. Chris might be there too. Let’s play Power Rangers.”

“Oh my God.”

They both laugh then. Josh’s chest feels warm. Matt probably has morning breath but he still looks like a dream.

Josh leans on the railing and looks out at the world. He can feel the wind blow.

“It’s beautiful,” he says.

Matt joins him.

“Yeah. Yeah, it is.”

_ Something always brings me back to you. _

_ It never takes too long. _

Josh reaches for Matt’s hand.

  
_fin._  
  
  



End file.
